


Cracks in the Tower

by Dodoa



Category: Lightbringer Series - Brent Weeks
Genre: Andross is not the perfect Lightbringer, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Inspired by Music, Post-The Burning White, Prophetic Dreams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:41:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24495199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dodoa/pseuds/Dodoa
Summary: The Ascension of the Lightbringer doesn't mean that the Chromeria doesn't need a Prism. With Dazen having regained his powers, will he retake the position he lost?
Relationships: Dazen Guile/Karris White Oak
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4





	Cracks in the Tower

**Author's Note:**

> The copyright for The Lightbringer Series belongs to Brent Weeks. This story is licensed under the Creative Commons as derivative, noncommercial fiction.
> 
> Massive spoilers for The Burning White, don't read this if you haven't finished the series. (Unless you like spoilers, then go ahead, I'm not your boss.)
> 
> This piece was inspired by "Castle of Glass" by Linkin Park which is my unofficial soundtrack to Dazen's Character Arc and which has been serving as my alarm clock for the last few weeks. And one morning this scene was just in my head demanding to be let out to play.

She found him on the roof.

Today Karris had, for the first time in weeks, woken up alone. Her first reaction had been disappointment. So, the honeymoon phase is over then, she’d thought. It had been followed by a more joyous thought, though. Her Dazen was getting stronger, recovering from the privation of the past two years. It wasn’t like he’d been staying in bed with her, solely because he wanted to. He’d simply desperately needed the rest. Mostly it had been her staying in bed with him, rather than the other way around. She had taken the opportunity to resume her pre-dawn workout with the blackguard (after a proper tongue-lashing by Samite for staying away for so long) and then come up here to watch the sun rise and pray before she faced her day.

Dazen had his forehead and palms pressed against the giant crystal and, apparently deep in concentration, he gave no sign that he’d noticed her. Not wanting to interrupt his meditation she sat down to watch the sun rise. It wasn’t the sunset so there was no chance of seeing a green flash, but then, she didn’t need Orholam’s wink to tell her that this was significant. As far as she knew this was the first time he’d been up here for something that was not a party since he’d come back to her. Part of her hoped that he was trying to balance, to reclaim what he’d lost, but she was afraid of what it would do to him if he couldn’t. In the few weeks he’d been back, he’d seemed content to play the White’s trophy husband, but he’d always been a man of purpose and she feared that sooner or later, not having one would destroy him. And so, she stayed, despite the plethora of duties awaiting her downstairs. Whatever the outcome, Dazen would need her there when he came out of this.

Karris didn’t have to wait long. Once the sun had fully cleared the horizon, Dazen spoke, not moving, not giving any other sign that he knew she was there.

“I can still feel the imbalances.”

So Andross had been wrong. The Lightbringer’s mirrors were no match for a true Prism like he had claimed. Karris had suspected as much (and made preparations in case she was right), but it was still a blow.

“How bad are they?” She asked walking up to him to offer her support. Either he had tried and failed to balance, or he hadn’t dared to try. She wondered, not for the first time, if it would help or hurt him if she told him that despite her hopes for him, she had already instructed her spies to be on the lookout for a new Prism. She was the Iron White after all. Her personal hopes and dreams had no place in her work.

“Not too bad for now, using the mirrors is doing some good at least. We shouldn’t have any problems with lightstorms this time, I think, but at this rate, we’re going to have to send out teams to look for bane soon.”

Karris wondered if Andross knew and just wouldn’t admit his failure or if he was simply ignorant. He wasn’t a lightsplitter after all. But Dazen was. And Orholam had told him that with Him healing was never partial.

“Maybe if you give it a bit more time you could…” Karris tried to encourage her husband.

“No Karris.” It was final. “I had a dream last night.”

He chuckled sadly and turned around to face her.

“You know, I thought I’d gotten used to the prophetic dreams. The straightforward ones, anyway. The ones where He speaks to me, the ones with instructions, even the ones where He just tells me I fucked up.” His devil-may-care grin was all mask. All old Gavin. To Karris, who knew him so well, it said, I’m pretending to be okay with this because I don’t have a choice, but it’s tearing me up inside.

“But tonight was different?” She took his hand, giving him a tether to draw him out of the darkness, knowing he would follow gladly.

“It was more like the judgement dream I had before… You know on the ship.”

“Where you thought Orholam was smiting you, but when it came true He was saving you from the Black?” She couldn’t help reminding him that his interpretation of that dream had been all wrong. She hoped that was the case with this one too.

He only nodded. Maybe Karris should have just let him talk.

“Want to tell me?” She put an encouraging hand on his still too skinny shoulder.

“I was on the tower again, facing the great mirror. I wasn’t trying to fix myself this time, but there was a crack in the surface. Tiny thing, barely visible, but growing. And Orholam didn’t see. He wasn’t there. So I tried to fix it myself before it reached the edge. I tried going through the mirror, but it wouldn’t let me through and whatever I tried only seemed to make the crack to grow faster. The mirror shattered, but the cracks didn’t stop. They spread to the tower, cracking stone and Orholam still didn’t see. I called for Him, but He did not hear me. I tried filling the cracks with luxin. Sub-red to melt them together. Red to glue them together. Orange to relieve the tension in the stone. Solid yellow to cover the whole tower and hold it together. Liquid yellow beneath everything to replenish the luxin. Green as a flexible bridge that could withstand the shear forces. Blue to fill in the cracks. Superviolet as a trigger to tell me when any part failed. But still the cracks spread through the tower and nothing I was doing worked. I drafted white off the tower itself and tried to replace the parts of it that were breaking. Whole slabs of stone. Throwing them broke bones in my body, but I couldn’t let the tower fall. It was all for nothing, the cracks ran too deep and I couldn’t replace the whole tower. So, finally, in my desperation and weakness I reached for the black. And the tower shattered.”

“You don’t believe that, though? That He doesn’t see you?”

“No. Elrahee, elishama, eliada, eliphalet. I know that to be true now,” he said with the utmost seriousness and the calm conviction of a man who knew himself to be seen, heard, cared for and saved. And then he let it all fall away and grinned at her: “Also, He’s the one who sent me this dream in the first place, so it’s not like He could _not_ know.” Karris marvelled how, after all these years and all he’d suffered, he could still let the light-hearted soul of the boy she had fallen in love with shine through that was giddy with joy at having seen through the ploys of his betters.

“So, what do you think He is trying to tell you?” Karris already knew the answer, but experience told her that he needed to say it out loud and drag it into the light before he could come to terms with the cold reality of it.

“It’s a warning,” he sighed. Swallowed. Took a deep breath and looked her in the eye. Both his blue and his prismatic eye were swimming with tears, but his voice didn’t waver: “I’m not meant to be Prism again. I won’t be the one to save the world this time.”

She didn’t tell him there were more ways than one to make a difference. That no Prism at all had been involved in saving them from the Colour Prince’s army. That just because he wasn’t going to be Prism again didn’t mean he would be nothing. She simply embraced him, wrapping her smaller form around him as best she could. She knew what it was like to have your life’s work taken from you.

After a while he unwrapped himself from her arms, and standing at the edge of the tower, facing the sun he continued: “The colours I have now are a gift, but the powers I used to have were stolen. Healing is not partial, but it can’t restore what wasn’t mine to begin with. I am what I have always been. A black Prism. The only way for me to be Prism is through the Black. I think father hopes to use me that way again should he need to, but that’s a slippery slope back to the way things were. It would be easy enough to justify, right now. I could join Corvan on his reconquest. Plenty of blood robes and wights still out there. It’s a war and they would be killed anyway. So, what does it matter if I take their powers first? Just to tide us over until a new Prism is found. And if no Prism is found in time? How could we not continue? How could we justify letting the bane rise? I understand very well why the Chromeria did what it did after Vician’s Sin, but that didn’t make it right and it doesn’t allow us to do the same thing when we know better. Doing evil for the greater good is still evil. It’s what made the Colour Prince’s message so seductive and what almost destroyed the faith. It’s also why Orholam hasn’t sent a true Prism for centuries.”

“If the bane rise again, the faith will take a pretty big hit anyway,” Karris couldn’t help pointing out as she stood with him, facing the new day. She understood and agreed with his reasoning and would support him if it came to blows with Andross over it, but the idea of letting the bane rise again filled her with horror.

“I never suggested allowing them to birth another god, I imagine the Mighty will be a good match for them if any do rise.”

“But we still need to find a Prism.”

“We still need to find a Prism.”


End file.
